Dear John:

This morning, IJ secured a resounding victory for government accountability and against qualified immunity when a federal appellate court ruled that our client—who was arrested after making a joke on Facebook—can proceed with his case.

In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Waylon Bailey posted an overtly satirical joke on his Facebook page, likening the pandemic to a zombie apocalypse (and to make his joke even more obvious, Bailey included a hashtag referencing the Brad Pitt movie World War Z). But he soon discovered that not everyone has a sense of humor.

The sheriff’s office arrived at his house with several armed officers, stormed in with guns drawn, arrested him, and took him to jail, alleging he had committed an act of terrorism. Though the district attorney dropped the case and Waylon was eventually released, the courts refused to hold the officials accountable—granting them qualified immunity and alleging that Waylon didn’t have any free speech rights to make the joke in the first place.

So, Waylon teamed up with IJ to appeal the case and hold the government officials accountable for violating his rights. And today, the 5th Circuit declared that the officers involved are not entitled to qualified immunity “because no reasonable officer could have found probable cause to arrest Bailey" for violating the state's anti-terrorism statute. This marks the second time in as many months that IJ has persuaded a federal court of appeals to overturn a lower court’s granting of qualified immunity for egregious behavior by government officials.

This case is one of 17 active cases in IJ’s Project on Immunity and Accountability, which is dedicated to the simple idea that if we the people must follow the law, our government must follow the Constitution. In fact, we’re currently waiting for the U.S. Supreme Court to take up one of these cases involving Sylvia Gonzalez, who was arrested and thrown in jail because she spoke out against her city manager.

Please consider donating to stand in defense of the Constitution’s safeguards for all Americans. ([link removed] )

Scott

Scott G. Bullock

President and Chief Counsel

Institute for Justice

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